Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections 17 (March 2018) Ancient Egyptian mortuary religion is full of ideas which, in their conventional Egyptological interpretation, are very difficult to take seriously, seemingly contradictory and naïve as they are. This has not been a major problem within the field of Egyptology itself due to a disciplinary stance that tends…
Dirt, Purity, and Spatial Control: Anthropological Perspectives on Ancient Egyptian Society and Culture during the Middle Kingdom
The concepts of purity and pollution were central to the maintenance of social boundaries in ancient Egyptian culture. Anthropological approaches, in particular the work of Mary Douglas, are useful in examining their impact on social structure and individual lived experience. Cleanliness and dirtiness were represented as defining characteristics of the ancient Egyptian elite and lower…
Write to Dominate Reality: Graphic Alteration of Anthropomorphic Signs in the Pyramid Texts
The communicative process implies objects, sounds, images and words which can convey ideas and cultural ways of interpreting and representing a society; therefore, many linguistic anthropologists—especially Searle, but also Bauman and Briggs—underline how speech and textual acts are regulated by defined cultural schemes, and how their study cannot exclude analysis of the original context as…
Power Relations and the Adoption of Foreign Material Culture: A Different Perspective from First-Millennium BCE Nubia
Questions of power relations have long been central to archaeological study of culture contact, with colonial relationships exciting particular interest. However, current frameworks do not account for the adoption of foreign material culture by cultures that are politically stronger than those from which they adopt. The wide variety of Egyptian material culture forms on display…
Into the Wild? Rethinking the Dynastic Conception of the Desert beyond Nature and Culture
The limited anthropization of environments like deserts has caused Dynastic hunting scenes to be overwhelmingly interpreted as aiming at ensuring (human) Order over (natural) Chaos. When systematically applied to animal iconography, however, this theory is symptomatic of what Philippe Descola has coined a “naturalist” ontology: a binary categorization where humans master and control the non-human…
Investigation and Analysis Study of an Old Kingdom Cheops First Boat Oar Blade
This paper describes the conservation process of one of the oars of the Cheops’ First Solar Boat. It was subjected to several scientific and analytical methods in this study in order to provide a deeper understanding of its materials and techniques of preservation as well as deterioration.
The Ship Depiction in the Tomb of Nebamun: The Earliest Egyptian Ship without a Hogging Truss
A scene in the tomb of Nebamun has been accepted without reservation since 1904 as portraying a Syrian patient sailing to Egypt in a Syrian ship while onshore he is being sent off by Syrians standing beside Asian humped bulls hitched to Syrian chariots. An analysis of this ship’s features indicates it is an Egyptian…
The Vernacular Boats of Egypt’s Natural Lakes: Documentation of Living Maritime Heritage
Boats are essentials of human interaction with aquatic net-ecosystems. Despite Egypt’s long-standing reliance on its maritime sphere and an increase in the study of ancient maritime life during the past few decades, the scarcity of references and academic readings discussing the living boats of the Egyptian natural lakes provides great opportunity. Often, the living boats…
Amulets in Context: A View from Late Bronze Age Tel Azekahs
JAEI 9 This paper presents evidence for the function of Egyptian amulets in daily life at Late Bronze Age Tel Azekah. The finding of the remains of two individuals in a destroyed Late Bronze Age building along with clusters of Egyptian scarabs and figurative amulets indicates that these artifacts were their personal belongings. It is…
Processional Barques from the Tomb of Tutankhamun (KV62)
JAEI 9 Ancient Egyptian processional (portable) barques took various forms, not all of which included shrines for cult images. Some of the model boats found in Tutankhamun’s tomb resemble and were probably originally shrineless processional barques used in festivals, rather than funerary models of solar barques in the usual sense.
Androgyny and Fecundity: Some Features of the Aegyptiaca around the Mediterranean
The Aegyptiaca widespread throughout the Mediterranean region sometimes display androgynous traits. This paper reviews past research on the subject in both foreign Aegyptiaca and in Egyptian art, particularly of the New Kingdom and later, tracing it back to mythological meanings.
An Anonymous Coffin and Cartonnage from Lahun: Retrieving the Archaeological Records
The publication of a coffin set, consisting of an anthropoid coffin and a cartonnage mummy-case, with a mummy, from Lahun. The coffin set, which was re-found in the basement of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo without inventory, represents the Northern provincial type of Middle Egypt and Fayum of the Third Intermediate to Late Periods. This…
On the Human Remains Contained in Count Aleksander Branicki’s Egyptian Coffin
We report on the scientific and historical study of a mummy associated with an Egyptian coffin once belonging to Count Aleksander Branicki, an important Polish collector who took part in two private expeditions to Egypt during the mid-nineteenth century. Recently the object was submitted for radiological investigation, as well as radiocarbon dating, in order to…
An Egyptian Game in Athens
Egyptian playing pieces found at Greek sites signal the possible introduction of senet in the Aegean region but no actual board has yet been excavated in Greece. The senet board with a recumbent lion, exhibited in the National Archaeological Museum at Athens and published here for the first time, was in fact collected in Egypt….
Five “New” Deities in the Roman Pantheon at Gebel el-Silsila
The list of Egyptian deities attested in Greek and demotic inscriptions in the sandstone quarries of Gebel el-Silsila comprises Amun, Horus, Hathor, Isis, Khnum, Montu, Pachimesen, and Shaï. Several new inscriptions and divine names are here added to previous records: the Egyptian gods Min, Bes, Tutu, and the Greek goddesses Athena and Tyche.
A Note on the Geographical Distribution of New Kingdom Egyptian inscriptions from the Levant
JAEI 9 This note compares the geographical distribution of New Kingdom Egyptian royal inscriptions, hieratic inscriptions and inscribed architectural elements from the Levant. It highlights a clear geographical north-south cut centered around the site of Beth Shean (Northern Palestine), the southern part showing clear signs of permanent Egyptian administration, and the northern part exhibiting signs…
The Nubian Mercenaries of Gebelein during the First Intermediate Period in Light of Recent Field Research
The Gebelein Archaeological Project and study of archaeological sites in its vicinity in recent years has resulted in the acquisition of new data concerning the topography of the region. This report presents a review of the Nubian presence in the region during the First Intermediate Period and proposes an explanation to their origin as well…
A Throne for Two: Image of the Divine Couple during Akhenaten’s Reign
A few representations of a divine couple enthroned, the female figure sitting in the lap of the male, have survived in Mesopotamian iconography, on terracotta and stone plaques, on the Ur-Namma stela from Ur, and on a Syrian cylinder seal of the 19th–18th centuries BCE. In Egypt, the motif is mostly restricted to the reign…
The Course of 14C dating does not Run Smooth: Tree-rings, Radiocarbon, and Potential Impacts of a Calibration Curve Wiggle on Dating Mesopotamian Chronology
We review evidence for near-absolute calendar date estimates for the Waršama Palace at Kültepe and the Sarıkaya Palace at Acemhöyük (Turkey) in light of a forensic examination of the radiocarbon calibration curve. Both palaces can be linked indirectly (but closely) to the Assyrian Revised Eponym List (REL) and can thus be connected with the Mesopotamian…
A Maximalist Interpretation of the Execration Texts—Archaeological and Historical Implications of a High Chronology
The two groups that now form the core of the Execration Texts (ET) are accepted as dating to the mid-12th and early 13th Egyptian dynasties, which have been synchronized to the Middle Bronze I in the southern Levant according to the Low Chronology. However, recent radiocarbon determinations suggest that those dynasties should instead be synchronized…
Djehutihotep and Megiddo in the Early Middle Bronze Age
The fragment of an Egyptian statue of Djehutihotep found at Megiddo by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (OI) has been long known. It was found with three uninscribed Egyptian statue fragments reused in the foundations of Temple 2048, attributed to Stratum VII, which was dated by them to the Late Bronze Age…
The Absolute Chronology of the Middle Bronze Age Palace at Tel Kabri: Implications for Aegean-Style Wall Paintings in the Eastern Mediterranean
A recent set of radiocarbon dates, run by the Oxford laboratory, has returned results considerably higher than expected for several phases of the Middle Bronze Age Canaanite palace at Tel Kabri. The samples suggest a date that is at least a century earlier than expected, which would indicate that miniature frescoes were being painted at…
Reevaluation of Connections between Egypt and the Southern Levant in the Middle Bronze Age in Light of the New Higher Chronology
The Middle Bronze Age in the southern Levant has long been a period subject to chronological debate, discussion, and dissension. Despite the common use of conventional dates and correlations, there is in reality little consensus regarding the dates for either the beginning or the end of the period, with the result that its duration also…
A Radiocarbon Chronology for the Middle Bronze Age Southern Levant
For a long time, absolute calendrical dates for the Middle Bronze Age southern Levant were based on very general correlations with the historical chronology of Egypt (the Traditional Chronology). A significantly lower chronology was proposed from the 1980s onwards, mainly based on the excavation at Tell el-Dab‘a (ancient Avaris) in the eastern Nile Delta (the…
Radiocarbon Evidence from Tell Abu en-Ni’aj and Tell el-Hayyat, Jordan, and Its Implications for Bronze Age Levantine and Egyptian Chronologies
Archaeological interpretation of the Levantine Bronze Age depends on a regional chronology based on material culture and settlement dynamics with presumed linkages to Egyptian political history. We discuss current radiocarbon sequences from Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj and Tell el-Hayyat in the northern Jordan Valley, Jordan that expand the traditional time range of the Early Bronze IV…
Synthesis: Summaries and Responses
Synthesis of the complete work
Cross-Regional Mobility in ca. 700 BCE: The Case of Ass. 8642a/IstM A 1924
The Neo-Assyrian administrative and juridical documents feature a striking characteristic: while persons identified as “Egyptians” seem to have been viewed as integral part of society, the scarcity of preserved biographic information defies a micro-historical approach in each case. Nevertheless, the corpus of sources explicitly mentioning “Egyptians” is exceedingly suited for opening up research questions on…
Cultural and Religious Impacts of Long-Term Cross-Cultural Migration Between Egypt and the Levant
An increase of cross-cultural learning as a consequence of increased travel and migration between Egypt and the Levant during the Iron Age occurred after millennia of migration in earlier times. The result was an Egyptian-Levantine koine, often not recognized as relevant by historians due to an uncritical reproduction of ancient myths of separation. However, the…
The Standard of Living of the Judean Military Colony at Elephantine in Persian Period Egypt
The settlement of Judean military colonists at Elephantine island at the southern border of Egypt is by far the best documented foreign community in this province of the Persian empire. The religious life of this military colony as well as the tension between the Judeans and the priests of the local god Khnum culminating in…
Pharaonic Prelude—Being on the Move in Ancient Egypt from Predynastic Times to the End of the New Kingdom
As textual, iconographic, and archaeological evidence shows, travel and mobility were an essential force within Egyptian culture. Not only the elite, including the pharaoh himself, but members of all social strata were also on the move. Travels to very distant destinations have been recorded since earliest times. The frequency of travel, as well as the…